50 WAYS TO CONFUSE, WORRY, OR JUST SCARE THE PEOPLE IN THE COMPUTER LAB
1. Log on, wait a sec, then get a frightened look on
your face and scream "Oh
my God! They've found me!" and bolt.
2. Laugh uncontrollably for about 3 minutes & then suddenly stop and look
suspiciously at everyone who looks at you.
3. When your computer is turned off, complain to the monitor on duty that you
can't get the darn thing to work. After he/she's turned it on, wait 5 minutes,
turn it off again, & repeat the process for a good half hour.
4. Type frantically, often stopping to look at the person next to you evilly.
5. Before anyone else is in the lab, connect each computer to different screen
than the one it's set up with.
6. Write a program that plays the "Smurfs" theme song and play it at
the highest volume possible over & over again.
7. Work normally for a while. Suddenly look amazingly startled by something on
the screen and crawl underneath the desk.
8. Ask the person next to you if they know how to tap into top-secret Pentagon
files.
9. Use Interactive Send to make passes at people you don't know.
10. Make a small ritual sacrifice to the computer before you turn it on.
11. Bring a chainsaw, but don't use it. If anyone asks why you have it, say "Just
in case..." mysteriously.
12. Type on VAX for a while. Suddenly start cursing for 3 minutes at everything
bad about your life. Then stop and continue typing.
13. Enter the lab, undress, and start staring at other people as if they're crazy
while typing.
14. Light candles around your terminal before starting.
15. Ask around for a spare disk. Offer $2. Keep asking until someone agrees.
Then, pull a disk out of your fly and say, "Oops, I forgot."
16. Every time you press Return and there is processing time required, pray "Ohpleaseohpleaseohpleaseohplease," and
scream "YES!" when it finishes.
17. "DISK FIGHT!!!"
18. Start making out with the person at the terminal next to you (It helps if
you know them, but this is also a great way to make new friends).
19. Put a straw in your mouth and put your hands in your pockets. Type by hitting
the keys with the straw.
20. If you're sitting in a swivel chair, spin around singing "The Lion Sleeps
Tonight" whenever there is processing time required.
21. Draw a picture of a woman (or man) on a piece of paper, tape it to your monitor.
Try to seduce it. Act like it hates you and then complain loudly that women (men)
are worthless.
22. Try to stick a Nintendo cartridge into the 3 1/2" disc drive, when
it doesn't work, get the supervisor.
23. When you are on an IBM, and when you turn it on, ask loudly where the smiling
Apple face is when you turn on one of those.
24. Print out the complete works of Shakespeare, then when it's all done (two
days later) say that all you wanted was one line.
25. Sit and stare at the screen, biting your nails noisely. After doing this
for a while, spit them out at the feet of the person next to you.
26. Stare at the screen, grind your teeth, stop, look at the person next to you.
Grind some more. Repeat procedure, making sure you never provoke the person enough
to let them blow up, as this releases tension, and it is far more effective to
let them linger.
27. If you have long hair, take a typing break, look for split ends, cut them
and deposit them on your neighbor's keyboard as you leave.
28. Put a large, gold-framed portrait of the British Royal Family on your desk
and loudly proclaim that it inspires you.
29. Come to the lab wearing several layers of socks. Remove shoes and place them
on top of the monitor. Remove socks layer by layer and drape them around the
monitor. Exclaim sudden haiku about the aesthetic beauty of cotton on plastic.
30. Take the keyboard and sit under the computer. Type up your paper like this.
Then go to the lab supervisor and complain about the bad working conditions.
31. Laugh hysterically, shout "You will all perish in flames!!!" and
continue working.
32. Bring some dry ice & make it look like your computer is smoking.
33. Assign a musical note to every key (ie. the Delete key is A Flat, the B key
is F sharp, etc.). Whenever you hit a key, hum its note loudly. Write an entire
paper this way.
34. Attempt to eat your computer's mouse.
35. Borrow someone else's keyboard by reaching over, saying "Excuse me,
mind if I borrow this for a sec?", unplugging the keyboard & taking
it.
36. Bring in a bunch of magnets and have fun.
37. When doing calculations, pull out an abacus and say that sometimes the old
ways are best.
38. Play Pong for hours on the most powerful computer in the lab.
39. Make a loud noise of hitting the same key over and over again until you
see that your neighbor is noticing (You can hit the space bar so your fill
isn't
affected). Then look at your neighbor's keyboard. Hit his/her delete key several
times, erasing an entire word. While you do this, ask: "Does *your* delete
key work?" Shake your head, and resume hitting the space bar on your keyboard.
Keep doing this until you've deleted about a page of your neighbor's document.
Then, suddenly exclaim: "Well, whaddya know? I've been hitting the space
bar this whole time. No wonder it wasn't deleting! Ha!" Print out your
document and leave.
40. Remove your disk from the drive and hide it. Go to the lab monitor and complain
that your computer ate your disk. (For special effects, put some Elmer's Glue
on or around the disk drive. Claim that the computer is drooling.)
41. Stare at the screen of the person next to you, look really puzzled, burst
out laughing, and say "You did that?" loudly. Keep laughing, grab
your stuff and leave, howling as you go.
42. Point at the screen. Chant in a made up language while making elaborate
hand gestures for a minute or two. Press return or the mouse, then leap back
and yell "COVEEEEERRRRRR!" peek
up from under the table, walk back to the computer and say. "Oh, good. It
worked this time," and calmly start to type again.
43. Keep looking at invisible bugs and trying to swat them.
44. See who's online. Send a total stranger a talk request. Talk to them like
you've known them all your lives. Hangup before they get a chance to figure out
you're a total stranger.
45. Bring a small tape player with a tape of really absurd sound effects. Pretend
it's the computer and look really lost.
46. Pull out a pencil. Start writing on the screen. Complain that the lead doesn't
work.
47. Come into the computer lab wearing several endangered species of flowers
in your hair. Smile incessantly. Type a sentence, then laugh happily, exclaim "You're
such a marvel!!", and kiss the screen. Repeat this after every sentence.
As your ecstasy mounts, also hug the keyboard. Finally, hug your neighbor,
then the computer assistant, and walk out.
48. Run into the computer lab, shout "Armageddon is here!!!!!", then
calmly sit down and begin to type.
49. Quietly walk into the computer lab with a Black and Decker chainsaw, rev
that baby up, and then walk up to the nearest person and say, "Give me that
computer or you'll be feeding my pet crocodile
for the next week".
50. Two words: Tesla Coil.